Visually Entertaining, but Ultimately Devoid of Anything but Bad Writing.

Rating: 3/10 (27 July 2015)

I will never truly understand why so many people enjoy and defend this movie. The common line is that the movie is about robots fighting giant monsters, so what did you expect? And while I guess that is true, there are so many other movies that this can be applied to that we generally agree are awful (Transformers). This movie has just as bad writing, just as flat characters, and just as cliché a plot as that series, and yet I'm supposed to forgive all that because the fight scenes are well made?
The problem with the "What did you expect?" argument is that sci-fi action doesn't have to be inherently stupid. "The Terminator" is just about a time traveling robot assassin, and yet it's held up by interesting characters and actual good writing. "RoboCop" is just about a cop who is turned into a cyborg, and yet the movie has satire and violently dark comedy. We shouldn't excuse an awful script full of rampant clichés and forced romance just because we like the fight scenes.
Speaking of which, I am giving it 3 stars because Guillermo obviously knows what he is doing in the special effects department and the overall look of the film is great. The problem with the fight scenes is that all of the characters are so flat and boring and unmemorable that I couldn't care less about the outcome. The tense chase scenes in the aforementioned Terminator work because we like the characters involved and we know the consequences of their failure. Sure, there are consequences in this movie, but so much infrastructure is destroyed that a bit more just seems irrelevant.
If you want to watch the fight scenes, just find them on YouTube, don't waste 2+ hours on this movie.